Hi Moms!
My daughter is having a fancy, dress up tea party for her 8th birthday. I am looking for ideas for food, decorations, and crafts or activities. There will be approximately 12 little girls aged 3 - 10 in attendance. I don't have a huge budget with which to work. Anyone know where I can get some inexpensive hats, gloves, boas for dress up/favors??
Thanks for all of your ideas! We had a great time! The girls all arrived in their fancy attire. We adorned them with bead necklaces from the 99cent store. I served "tea sandwiches", hot tea, iced tea, and lemonade. For dessert they made their own strawberry shortcakes. As they arrived, we took a picture of each girl with the birthday girl. During the party, they each decorated a whitewashed wooden frame using craft foam shapes. While they ate, my husband printed each photo and the girls took the framed picture home as their "favor". My daughter loved her party and wants to do it again! :)
For inexpensive favors, try the Oriental Trading Company. www.orientaltrading.com. Sounds like a fun party.
M.
You have gotten some great suggestions from other mom's- I love the cookie, strawberry shortcake and sundae ideas!
For some of my daughter's parties, I have included on the invitation, that it is a "dress up" tea party theme. That way, the girls will come in the hats, gloves, boas and tiara's, so you don't have the expense of supplying them. Also- since everyone looks a little different, it makes for some great pictures!
Incidentally, I'm interested in hearing about your in home wine tastings!! What city are you in?
Thanks, M.
Oriental Traders has a lot of inexpensive stuff---they are a catalog company and you can view and order online. You can also search for tea party ideas online and you will find a plethora of ideas!
Party City has tons of stuff and their prices are reasonable. Michaels Craft Store is really great as well. Why dont you have the girls make strawberry shortcakes, very simple and they can all help make them then all sit and have tea iced or hot. Or another fun thing would be to pretend they are being waited on like at a restaurant and you and another mom can wait on them offer like 2-3 items they can chose from with their tea.
Have them all bring dolls and they can also have a tea party for them. You can get really cheap tea set for the dolls at Walmart or I saw a cheap one at CVS pharmacy my aunt bought for my daugher she uses it everyday to have a tea party. You could also have an ice cream sundae bar with all the fixings.
Another thing girls love is painting each others nails and doing eachothers hair, Another mom would have to help but they would love to do eachothers make-up and such.
Good Luck and maybe they can all watch an American girl movie those are very cute and girls that age love American girl. They have a wonderful American girl tea room, I suggest doing that with your daughter it is perfect for little girls.
Good luck!!
I used to host tea parties at christmas time as a girl. One of the best activities we did was to decorate sugar cookies. you can get several tubes of the decorating icing in various colors and sprinkles. A bit messy but so much fun. you get to eat some and then take some home to show off your artwork! and this covers the favors! just make up a big batch of sugar cookies (b-day girl can help do this too) before hand. let b-day girl pick the cookie cutter shapes too. good luck and have fun!!
if you have nasturtium, pansies and some roses are edible and can give a really wonderful look to the teas or food that you serve.
also, if you have the time, 40% off coupons for joanne's or michael's can help to reduce costs, too.
Good luck....sounds fun.
A friend of mine threw a surprise un birthday party for her 30 yr old sister-her real bday is xmas. She hunted at thrift stores for tea cups and saucers. Everyone drank out of them and then those were also the favors. There were plenty of ugly ones, but no one cared. And she had finger sandwiches. But, she also had a rabbit pinata. It was fantastic!
Check out Big Lots. They may have some things available. I've ordered from Oriental Trading before and while their stuff is inexpensive, the quality isn't very good either.
For crafts you can have them make their own tiara. Do a search online too, I'm sure you'll get a ton of ideas.
Good luck!
I know of at least two places in Long Beach/Lakewood. One is on Viking Way and one is on Atlantic. just google tea houses and I'm sure they will come up.
I would get cheap straw hats, probably from oriental trading company, then have the girls decorate them with ribbons and fake flowers, try big lots or look for coupons for Michael's for those. The girls can have an activity, costume, and party favor all in one.
Serve kid friendly sandwiches cut in fancy shapes and serve them along with something sweet, and tea of coarse!
I did a party like this for my daughter 2 years ago.
They had a great time "making" the flower arrangement by having a relay race: 2 groups, vases at one end and carnations at the other (enough for each girl to grab a flower) then the flower arrangments get a little water & go onto the table.
Also, we had a cake walk at the end- which none of the girls had ever experienced. A chalk circle with tea party images drawing in each square... we played until each girl won, chose a plate of cupcakes (left over homemade cake mix with silly flowers designs on top and then sat out. I started & stopped the music and chose the winning design (from a tea pot) until the first girl won. Then she (and the subsequent winners) got to run the music & choose the winning design.
Cupcakes are very economical 'goodie bags'.
Have fun.
